Insider’s Troubling Update on Commanders’ Terry McLaurin

The clock keeps on ticking for the Washington Commanders to get something done with their star wide receiver, Terry McLaurin.

At this stage of the offseason, McLaurin is practically in a standoff with his organization. Although he showed signs of potentially participating in OTAs at first, he ultimately decided against it. When mandatory minicamp rolled around, McLaurin was noticeably absent, leaving key members of the team to field questions about the situation as it unfolded.

“Sometimes football and business, they intersect and this is one of those times,” Commanders head coach Dan Quinn told reporters a couple of weeks back. “Terry is a fantastic teammate and really puts in the work and spent a lot of time with them already this offseason. The business side of things, Adam [Peters] and their crew and Terry and his group, let them work through that.”

This season, McLaurin is slated to play on a $15.5 million salary. It’s the final year of his three-year, $68.3 million deal. As the wideout continues to produce at an All-Pro level, McLaurin wants a pay boost to reflect that. That’s been made clear before spring practices. Now that training camp is roughly one month away, has there been any progress?

ESPN’s Adam Schefter painted a scary picture for Terry’s situation with Washington this week.

“There is no update, which is the update, and that’s the problem,” Schefter said on the ‘Pat McAfee Show.’

“The problem is with this particular situation, I think that Terry McLaurin is going to argue that we’ve seen other wide receivers, who his numbers are comparable to …. get paid over $30 million a year this offseason. I think the Commanders then can say, ‘Yes, but Mike Evans, who also has had comparable numbers, is at $24 million.’ So, there really is quite a difference and a gap between what both sides would want. They have not made any progress.”

The NFL Insider suggests that the situation might get to a point where other teams could begin “snooping around” to see if McLaurin is available on the trade market. While teams might try, Schefter makes it clear that a McLaurin trade doesn’t seem realistic at this time.

“I cannot envision the Commanders moving on from him, no matter how disgruntled he may be,” Schefter stated.

The bottom line is that both sides want to stay together, but they remain far away from making it happen. The good news is that a deal can get done quickly as soon as somebody decides to budge. Ideally, the Commanders would lock in McLaurin by the time training camp approaches. Right now, that scenario is not in play.

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